Uphaar fire tragedy: Delhi court frees Ansal brothers due to old age

In a big relief for the Ansal brothers, a Delhi court on Tuesday released Gopal and Sushil Ansal after sentencing them to a period already undergone in connection with the Uphaar cinema fire evidence tampering case. Delhi's Patiala House court on Tuesday reduced the sentence of the Ansal brothers and other convicts to the period undergone in the case due to their 'advanced age'. The convicts had challenged the conviction and sentence of 7 years. 

The court took note of the old age of the convicts while deciding on the quantum of punishment of the convicts in the fire tragedy that had claimed 59 lives. District judge Dharmesh Sharma, however, said the fine would remain untouched.As complainant Neelam Krisnamoorthy broke down in the court, Justice Sharma consoled her saying nothing can compensate her loss, but the convicts' age had to be considered in the case. “Although morally I feel that arguments are impactful. Nothing can compensate your loss,” he added.Krisnamoorthy said she was very disappointed with the system and the ruling sent a wrong message that culprits can easily have their way by killing anyone.

A magisterial court had earlier convicted and awarded seven-year jail terms to the real estate barons in the case, besides imposing a fine of ₹2.25 crore on each of them.The case is related to tampering with the evidence in the main fire tragedy case in which the Ansals were convicted and sentenced to a two-year jail term by the Supreme Court.However, the top court released them taking into account the prison time they had undergone on the condition that they pay a ₹30 crore fine each, to be used for building a trauma centre in the national capital.According to the charge sheet, the documents tampered with included a police memo giving details of recoveries immediately after the incident, Delhi Fire Service records about repair of transformer installed inside the cinema hall, minutes of Managing Director's meetings, and four cheques.